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Tourism: Jerusalem - the global capital of tourism security

As much a matter of perception as the safety itself.
Feeling secure is as important as being secure. That was the key message
emerging from this week’s International Tourism Security Conference in
Jerusalem, attended by tourism and security executives from all over the
world – all eager to learn from Israel’s undesirably-gained experience
in keeping its visitors safe while combating terrorism.
“The tourism product is the most complicated [one] on sale. It is a
trust or belief product,” Dirk Glaesser, the Director for Sustainable
Development of Tourism at the UN’s World Tourism Organization (UNWTO),
told conference goers.“Compared to other products, which can assess when
there will be a crisis, you have to trust or believe those [who are]
presenting to you the tourism product,” Glaesser added.

Terrorist attacks have the potential to devastate a city’s tourism
industry, causing would-be visitors to look elsewhere for a product
perceived to be safer and more trustworthy.

A Belgian study evaluating the impact of the March 2016 triple-suicide
bombing in Brussels detailed the considerable effect of the attacks on
the city’s tourism, and even on the entire country. Overnight stays in
Brussels hotels decreased by some 24.3% in the first nine months of
2016, compared to the same period in 2017. In Belgium as a whole,
overnight stays decreased by 5.2%.

The data shows that foreign visitors transferred the perceived lack of
security in the Belgian capital to the remainder of the country, with
British and French citizens the quickest to stay away.

Brussels is one of several major cities that Ilanit Melchior, director
of tourism at the Jerusalem Development Authority, has advised regarding
tourism security and how to ensure the continuation of the industry
despite looming threats of terrorism.During the decade that Melchior has
headed the authority’s tourism department, the country has experienced
three major military operations in Gaza as well as the 2015-16 wave of
violence in Israeli cities dubbed by some as the “knife intifada.”
During the same period, Jerusalem saw inbound tourism grow by 47%. Last
year, 78% of the record-breaking 3.6 million tourists who visited Israel
toured Jerusalem.

“Three months after the attacks in Brussels, I went to the town center.
Everyone was tense; there were tanks and machine guns,” Melchior told
The Jerusalem Post.

“I went to the city for a coffee and everything was closed – there were
only candles,” she added. “It’s a question of time, experience and the
way a nation would like to grieve, but you have to bear in mind the need
to manage the situation.”

FOLLOWING TERROR attacks in Jerusalem, Melchior is quick to send her
staff to the streets, equipped with their phone cameras. By interviewing
people on the ground, explaining that the city has returned to normal,
her department manages to fill the vacuum left after statements
regarding the violence have been made by the military, police and senior
politicians.

If, during the Second Intifada, indiscriminate terror attacks against
civilians were perceived as a primarily Israeli problem, that perception
is no longer the case. Major attacks in recent years in New York,
Barcelona, London, Manchester, Paris, Nice, Stockholm and Brussels have
made Israeli expertise more critical than ever.

As the understanding of the need for Israeli security know-how grows,
this week’s summit drew experts from countries including the United
States, United Kingdom, Turkey, Germany, France and Japan.

For Melchior and her Israeli colleagues, the key to a steadfast tourism
industry is not based on denying the existence of security concerns.
Rather, it is the job of cities to ensure that tourists are strongly
aware of the safety measures put in place to prevent and react to
terrorist attacks.

“The tourist today does not know when and where the next event will take
place, but he does know that Israel is safe and that we have experience
in dealing with terrorist incidents,” Tourism Ministry director-general
Amir Halevi told the conference.

According to leading travel website TripAdvisor’s 455 million users,
Halevi’s comments are an accurate depiction of global perception.

“The company’s research among users shows that Israel, and specifically
Jerusalem, are both considered as safe as any other tourist
destination,” said Justin Reid, VP of Marketing at TripAdvisor. The
website hosts more than a million reviews of places to stay and things
to do in Israel.

“The scores here are great. With an average of over 4 out of 5, the
message about the great product is being spread by your greatest
advocates – people who have been there,” Reid told the Post.

KEEPING SECURITY matters in proportion is important as well. Terrorism
is only responsible for a very small share of deaths in the world
annually – in 2016, only 0.06% compared to 32.26% from cardiovascular
diseases.

The British Royal Statistical Society’s “International Statistic of
2017” was awarded to the number 69. Why? “This is the annual number of
Americans killed, on average, by lawnmowers – compared to two Americans
killed annually, on average, by immigrant Jihadist terrorists,” said the
society.

Yet the threat of terrorism for the tourism industry lies not in its
statistical improbability, but rather in its volatility,
unpredictability and fear-inducing capabilities.

Yossi Fatael, Head of the Israel Incoming Tour Operators Organization,
sees tourism security expertise as not only a tool to help others, but
also as a business opportunity.

“We need to integrate ‘the elephant in the room’ that everyone ignores,”
said Fatael. “Security is among the three most important elements for
the average tourist, and therefore must be part of an overall tourism
practice.

“We are talking about a need and concern of every traveling tourist, and
hence the industry must develop a dedicated toolbox and provide a
direct response where the service is an added amenity that can be
charged for.”

Those attending the conference will return to their home countries with a
two-fold understanding of Israeli expertise. The Israeli tourism
security “toolbox” is based, they will have learned, on both years of
necessary security expertise and a willingness to confront the issue and
reassure potential visitors.

“We want to be identified by the agriculture, the science, the
technology, the medicine, as the start-up nation – however, reality is
not so,” said Brig.-Gen. (Res.) Avi Benayahu, former IDF spokesperson
and strategic consultant for the summit.

“Along with the development of Israel, we gained a heaviness in war.
Israel’s stance on the issue is that only global solutions can fix
global problems, such as the terrorism problem,” he said.

The seeds of such a global tourism security effort were planted this week in Jerusalem.